Social Media Strategy

Social media is used by fashion retailers to brand awareness, drive fan engagement, and provide merchandise previews to name a few. All of this is to navigate customers to their websites and to increase e-commerce sales.

Keep.com audience is women between 20 and 30 years old. Since Instagram is popular with fashion blogs and live fashion events, Keep.com created a list of most fashionable women. This list included 100 artists, musicians, models, and actresses. From that list of influential women, Keep.com focused on the makeup, jewelry, shoes, and handbags that the celebs were wearing. They then gave customers links to websites where they could buy them.

Rue LA LA is an online fashion retailer for members only. They used Pinterest to create a “Mom’s of Style” campaign. They asked the users to make a board about their mom’s fashion style. The top three winners were featured in a Mother’s Day boutique.

Burberry is a British luxury brand. They used an “Art of the Trench” campaign inviting trench coat aficionados to post images on their Facebook page. The people, influenced by fashion bloggers, voted on their favorite looks. This campaign boosted Burberry’s page to over a million fans. They now rank among the top fashion icons like Ralph Lauren, Kate Spade, and Gucci.

Kate Spade of New York is known around the world for stylish and bold designer clothing, shoes, and fashion accessories. They use Facebook to create brand awareness and to nurture customer relations. They use Twitter to reach fashion lovers and to develop trends. Kate Spade uses Instagram to give their followers a sneak peek into their corporate headquarters. Not surprising, they also use Flickr, Tumblr, and YouTube for promoting photos, and other visual content.

Free People is a bohemian lifestyle brand. They encourage people to upload pictures of themselves wearing clothes and apparel from their fashion line. By utilizing Twitter and Instagram, Free People encourages their users to tag pictures with specific hashtags. Customers receive a card in every shipment with the hashtag information.

While the article features only 5 fashion brands, it is still important to point out that social media plays a major role in all fashion purchases across numerous fashion brands.

Do you know of any retailers using social media the fashionable way? I’m listening. Please share.

Sharing meals with family and friends has always been a social event. With the popularity of eating out at restaurants, social media is playing a major role in attracting new customers and maintaining loyalty of patrons.

Restaurants use social media to gain feedback and insight on menu items and service. They also update customers with new openings, promote contests, and monitor reputations by using multiple social platforms.

Below are 5 restaurants that are using social media as a menu for success:

Starbucks embraced social media early on and it didn’t hurt that drinking coffee was already a social activity. They offer quality products and promote social interaction with free WiFi in every location. But that is not where it stops. They use Facebook to inform their customers of new services and products instead of trying to sell them something. When Starbucks takes a photo, they post it on Facebook, tweet it on Twitter, share it on Instagram, and pin it on Pinterest. They also have a mystarbucksidea which is an online community where people can make suggestions and submit ideas to improve products and services.

Their unique way of using Twitter involves reaching out to customers that have complaints or negative feedback. They encourage dissatisfied customers to follow-up using a Twitter related email address. Call it tweeting damage control.

Babbo Ristorante is Mario Batali’s fine dining restaurant in New York. They post on Facebook daily with pictures of the fresh fish of the day, uncorking of wine, and behind the scenes from the chefs. They also embrace YouTube and Instagram to share videos and pictures of their food.

Barbbos uses Twitter to notify their patrons of any cancellations and include the times and availability for guests.

The Hard Rock Cafe devotes a whole page on their website to social media engagement. “Get social with 13 million strong” is proudly displayed on their social page with links to Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Tumblr, Pinterest, Google+, and YouTube. No rock is left unturned. They encourage fans to tag their pics with popular hashtags and provide a convenient upload button.

The breakfast diner chain Denny’s openly invites their fans to “stalk us online”. One can stalk them by using Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, Instagram, and YouTube. They always engage their fans with interesting and creative content and displays their social media in the center of their website’s homepage.

Six months ago, they launched a Hispanic Facebook page that already has acquired 53,000 likes. They maintain a Tumblr page to reach a younger crowd. In addition, they are introducing an animated YouTube series called “The Grand Slams” premiering soon.

Jack in the Box social media presence is for those that “like” fast food and snarky updates. They use Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, and Tumblr to promote their food and the Jack character.

Last month, Jack in the Box achieved a Guinness World Record tile by setting the record for the largest coupon. It measured 80 feet tall by 25 feet wide. The coupon was carried down the street to a Jack in the Box drive thru, redeemed, then hung on a high-rise building. Fans were encouraged take a picture to redeem the coupon and to share the coupon socially on Twitter using #WorldsLargestCoupon.

Is your restaurant using social media to its fullest? Do you have a social media menu for success? I’m listening. Please share.

Do you know how much time is actually spent by people using social media? Day in the Life of the Internetis an infographic that breaks down the statistics of internet users and where they spend their time socially. With over 3 hours a day spend by people visiting social media sites, it only makes sense for your brand to be connected and engaged with customers and prospects by the way of social media.

But, that’s not enough. Are you listening about your brand? If your brand is to be the trusted source of information and products, then you need to respect your customers and prospects by listening to them.

One of the most sincere forms of respect is actually listening to what another has to say. – Bryant H. McGill

Social media monitoring, also know as social media listening, is all about listening to what is important and responding when your brand is mentioned online.

Social Media Monitoring tools such as Hootsuite, Rapportive, and Boomerang are useful tools to consider for listening about your brand. They help you to discover:

Positive and Negative Comments – Hearing positive things about your brand is great and reassure you that you are doing the right things. But, it is also important to address the negative. Damage control can help reestablish the trust and respect of your customers.

Questions – Monitoring the frequently asked questions about your brand or industry can open an opportunity for you to create content to help answer those questions.

Trends – Tracking trends opens the door for your brand to be proactively mentioned into the conversation.

Influencers – Monitoring social media can help your brand by locating someone in your industry that has a social voice louder than the others. This is a great opportunity to learn from their success.

Links – Tracking who is linking to your brand is helpful for search engine optimization campaigns.

Languages – Acknowledging the languages that your brand is being mentioned in helps your brand by determining the languages required to communicate effectively. This and make it a priority to translate content and/or consider multi-language customer service.